We’re working on a Web Literacy Standard. The first draft is already launched, we’re working towards beta, and the v1.0 launch will be at MozFest in October. You can find out how to get involved here.

At Mozilla we want to create a generation of Webmakers. Or, as Mitchell Baker, our Chair and Chief Lizard Wrangler, puts it:

Mozillians are people who make things. Moving people from consumption to creation is Mozilla’s goal.

To that end we created Webmaker.org, a site featuring free tools and content to help anyone (and everyone) understand how to use the building blocks of the Web. My original role was to provide a framework to underpin the Webmaker work, attempting to answer the question: what are the skills, competencies and literacies required to read, write and participate on the Web?

We soon realised that this work was applicable to many more projects than Webmaker. There’s so many people and organizations doing such excellent stuff around Web Literacy, but it’s a fragmented landscape. Learners don’t know what they don’t know, and organizations providing learning content aren’t usually in a position to offer a comprehensive range of learning activities. The work needs joining-up.

That’s why from January onwards I’ve been working with my colleague Carla Casilli and the community in pivoting our previous work towards co-creating a Web Literacy Standard. This is something that organizations will be able to align with by using Open Badges - itself a new online standard to recognize and verify learning.

A few weeks ago we launched our first draft of the standard, comprising of a competency grid and some competency descriptors. This is the result of talking to some smart thinkers in the area as well as discussing community needs on our weekly calls. This is a delicate, nuanced process as there are many different environments and contexts to which this work can be applied.

We’re aiming to launch the beta version of the Web Literacy Standard on June 26thJuly 26th. In addition to the competency grid and descriptors, the beta version will include:

a list (with descriptors) of the skills underpinning each competency

an explanation of how different competencies roll up together into ‘meta-level’ competencies (e.g. identity, storytelling)

a design pass to explain in a visual way how the standard works

Another thing we’ll be working on is explaining in more detail how people can align with the standard. If that’s something you’d like to start talking about right now then jump on our weekly community call or get in touch using the details below!